The ties that bind inspire my fiction.

Outsiders

A man whom people at the coffee shop call “the town crazy” lives on Main Street in this now-gentrified village, long-ago site of a mill and not much else except farmland. Tastefully painted former warehouses blend in with the new: a community theater, a park with walkways over and beside the easy-moving river. I’ve never seen him sitting on a bench beneath the stately wooden gazebo where the community orchestra performs. He walks the street after sundown. I hear he is a veteran.

He’d lived here as many years as I have, twenty. Few know me. I am solitary too, though I hang out at the coffee shop on weekends with my pen and paper and the obligatory cell phone that connects me, sort of, with the rest of the world. I decided to introduce myself to him one August evening when a desire to stroll in the company of others prompted me to forego my early evening solitary walks down the dirt road that continues for a few miles beyond my country home. He ambled with a limp and muttered under his breath when he passed me, averting his eyes. The legs of his khaki slacks scrapped the sidewalk. He wore a red tee shirt that outlined the hump of his belly.

“Good evening,” I said loud enough to interrupt his conversation with himself.

He stopped. His arms twitched and he cleared his throat. “I don’t talk with strangers.”

“Fred, excuse me, but why don’t you paint your house, the one I’ve seen you walk into after your evening walks?”

“Lady…”

“Call me ‘Sue.'”

“Sue, I can’t afford to buy the paint or I would.”

“I see, and what about benefits like, maybe, veterans’s benefits.”

“How did you know, Sue?”

“I didn’t, Fred, and you told me what I wanted to know.”

“Yes, I am a veteran.”

“Guess, the Vietnam War?”

“That’s right, Sue.”

“Okay, Fred, what happened?”

“Sue, I am not a monkey in a cage.”

“Fred, did I say you are?”

“No. I lived in a bamboo cage for a year after I was captured.”

“Did you eat food?”

“Monkey food. Bananas and even green leaves.”

“What’s your diet like now?”

“Peanut butter and jelly.”

“Why’s that?”

“The doctors say I’m disabled.”

“Anything, Fred, you like to do besides survive on peanut butter sandwiches?”

“Yes. Paint houses. Paint pictures too.”

“This might be your lucky day, Fred. I want you to paint the window ledges of my home. And I want you to paint a picture, what it felt like to you living in a bamboo cage. I will pay you $350 for the painting.”

“Even if you don’t like the painting?”

“Yes.”

“Are you rich, Sue?”

“Some say I am. I know what I like. I know what I want.”

“Sue, why can’t you paint your own window ledges?”

“Fred, look at me. I am short. I am also afraid of falling off ladders.”

“Why?”

“I fell off a ladder when I was 36 years old. It hurt.”

“How high was the ladder?”

“Above the glass ceiling, very high.”

“How high was the glass ceiling?”

“High, though the ladder extended far above it.”

“When you fell off the ladder, did you break the glass ceiling?”

“No. I’d already broken the ceiling.”

“I don’t get it. Were you injured when you fell off the ladder? Disabled like I am?”

“No. I was not injured to the point of disability. I was on a mission.”

“What, Sue?”

“To create a hole in the glass ceiling.”

“Why?”

“To pave the way for ladies like me who did excellent work.”

“How did you do it?”

“Ability. Nerve. Hard work. Never taking no for an answer when the answer required a ‘yes.’ Being charming enough not to seem like a pest. Brave, like a soldier.”

Fred looked at me with smiling eyes. “Do you like coffee, Sue?”

“I prefer tea.”

“How about after I paint that painting you want and your window ledges too, how about some tea at the coffee shop?”